LAST RESPECTS: Laikipia North MP Sarah Lekorere puts soil into the grave of Leshado Kinyanyi, a 16-year-old boy who was trampled an elephant at Kurikuri area in Laikipia North on Tuesday. Image: ELIUD WAITHAKA

A Standard 6 boy killed by an elephant while herding livestock in Kurikuri area in Laikipia North has been buried.

Leshado Kinyanyi died on the spot and his body was interred at Nanyuki cemetery on Tuesday.

Laikipia North MP Sarah Lekorere said during the burial that the government and the Kenya Wildlife Service have failed to act despite rising deaths due to human-wildlife conflict.

At least 35 people have been killed by elephants in the area since 2014 when the Wildlife Act was ratified, and only seven people have been lined up for compensation, the MP said. None is yet to be paid.

This year alone, three school-going children have been trampled on by the jumbos.

“We are not going to bury another human being killed by wildlife in Laikipia North,” Lekorere said.

The legislator noted that in the whole of the subcounty only four KWS rangers conduct patrols using a motorbike.

“How can that happen while we have a neighbouring private ranch hosting over 50 KWS rangers with three vehicles and a number of National Police Reservists armed with government guns,” the MP said.

She that she will mobilise other leaders and residents to protest against the Ministry of Tourism and the KWS.

Lekorere said the Wildlife Act must now be implemented.

The lawmaker was accompanied by former National Cohesion and Integration Commission chairman Francis Ole Kaparo, Mukogodo East MCA Daniel Nyausi and nominated MCA Zamzam Salma.

She accused Tourism CS Najib Balala of playing with people’s lives by announcing that proceeds from his ministry have increased while people were suffering.

“We do not have any gazetted private ranch in Laikipia yet their animals are the ones terrorising our people. They enjoy a hundred per cent profit from these animals,” Lekorere said.

Nyausi and Salma also lamented that the wild animals were destroying crops and rendering local residents paupers.